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If you want a video tutorial on ball tampering, see what Faf did yesterday!

Yesterday, Faf Du Plessis of South Africa was clearly seen rubbing one side of the ball vigorously against a zipper on his pant. There can only be one reason for doing this - Faf wanted to roughen up one side of the ball in order to get it to swing. If you are running a cricket academy and wanted to teach young bowlers on what they are NOT supposed to be doing, show them this video (http://www.espncricinfo.com/pakistan-v-south-africa-2013-14/content/current/story/682501.html). This is about as clear as evidence gets when talking about ball tampering.

There are a couple of things that have happened as a result of this - that are bizarre and funny - at the same time.
1. A B DeVillers has come out in support of Faf and said something to the effect “We do not cheat, period….” or some nonsense like that. Either AB has not seen the video, or is a complete idiot or believes the rest of us are fools. I really like AB - so my vote would be for either 1 or 2 :-)
2. Immediately, there are articles written about whether these tactics should be legalised. The logic peddled most of the time is this - everyone does this, so let us make it legal, so that everyone can benefit from ball tampering. To me this is akin to saying - “why should only a few people drive their cars drunk. let us legalise this, so everyone can benefit from this”. In cricket, as in life, very few things are black and white. This particular incident is clearly and unequivocally wrong. Faf should be banned and effort should be taken to see if he did this at the instance of South Africa’s captain or team management.

The joke here is that South Africa is easily and handsomely winning the match. There was absolutely no need to resort to such tactics. The scary explanation to this would be that they do it immaterial of the situation of the game - in other words, they do it all the time. For the sake of cricket, I hope I am wrong.

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